


If You Can't Say Anything Nice...

by duplicity



Series: Paid in Compliments [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Bad Flirting, Fluff, Humor, M/M, Romance, Snarky Harry Potter, Texting, Tom Riddle being a Drama Queen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-30
Updated: 2019-12-30
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:35:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22025674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/duplicity/pseuds/duplicity
Summary: In which Tom is terrible at socializing (and texting), but possesses a strong desire to have Harry say nice things about him.Harry regrets giving Tom his number, and then he doesn’t.
Relationships: Harry Potter/Tom Riddle
Series: Paid in Compliments [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1600702
Comments: 59
Kudos: 888





	If You Can't Say Anything Nice...

**Author's Note:**

> wrote 1/2 of this at work, 1/4 on the bus, and the remaining 1/4 at home.

Harry had given Tom Riddle his number at one of those freshman mixers. Well, ‘given’ was a generous term. Tom had been a bit… aggressive... in his pursuit, which was fine, because Harry wasn’t intimidated by him in the slightest. In fact, Harry found Tom amusing. Tom was clearly someone who was used to getting what he wanted, and Harry was having a fantastic time not giving it to him.

They’d been texting back and forth for a few weeks now, and it had gotten to the point where Harry’d stopped bothering with grammar and punctuation. He figured that Tom, with his perfectly punctuated sentences, would find it annoying.

The odd thing was, Tom continued to text Harry anyway, like it was a game, and even though Harry was pretty sure Tom had an ego larger than Dudley was wide, Tom wasn’t put off by any of Harry’s snarky comments.

If anything, it had incited an obsession as Tom tried increasingly creative ways to get Harry to say something nice to him.

* * *

**Tom:** Compliment me.

**Harry:** ur ok

**Tom:** ... Only 'ok'?

**Harry:** cant spell any words longer than that

**Tom:** All of those words are longer than that.

**Harry:** i meant compliments specifically

* * *

**Tom:** Harry, I have had a very long day. So it would please me greatly if you were to say some nice things about me.

**Harry:** ur tolerable on a good day

**Tom:** That's not a nice thing.

**Harry:** its about u

**Harry:** so i got it half right, which is wat matters

**Harry:** if this was a class i would have passed it

* * *

**Harry:** ur pretty cool

**Tom:** Why, thank you. I knew you would see the light eventually, Harry.

**Harry:** sorry i meant 2 send that 2 ron

**Harry:** ur names look the same when im not wearing my glasses

**Harry:** my bad

* * *

Okay, maybe Harry was having a little _too_ much fun with all of this. But he wasn’t about to admit it to anyone, and he certainly wasn’t going to tell _Tom_ that he liked their childish banter. It would do unspeakable things to Tom’s already inflated sense of ego.

However, on one early Saturday morning, Harry had gotten a new text from Tom that was too good of an opportunity to pass up. Harry had felt safe in sending a truly ridiculous response without too much thought to the consequences. But Harry’s big mistake was how he’d assumed that Tom’s ego, while ridiculously inflated, was still an ego that belonged to a _reasonable person_.

* * *

**Tom:** What will it take for you to say something nice about me?

**Harry:** buy me a new phone

* * *

Later that afternoon, there was a knock on Harry’s bedroom door.

“Harry,” said his mum. “There’s a package for you at the door. They’re saying you have to sign for it.”

* * *

**Harry:** YOU LITERALLY SENT ME A NEW PHONE WHAT THE FUCK IS YOUR PROBLEM

**Tom:** It is not my fault you weren't clear about your request. Now, I do believe I am owed a compliment.

**Harry:** THIS IS A THOUSAND QUID PHONE YOU ARE CRAZY

**Tom:** I’m not sure how you were raised, but I can tell you that that is not a nice thing to say to someone who just bought you a new phone.

**Harry:** where do you live tom i am coming over to return this right now

* * *

Tom lived in a dorm room on campus. It had taken Harry five minutes to throw on a hoodie and grab his wallet with his bus pass, twenty minutes to bus to their school, and then another twenty minutes to find the stupid correct door number.

Knocking his fist loudly against the door, Harry waited to be let in.

The door unlocked after a moment. Tom was wearing a navy blue button down and grey trousers. He had his brows raised as he stared expectantly at Harry. Harry hadn’t seen Tom since the day they had first met, which was now nearly a month ago. Harry had forgotten that Tom was kind of hot.

“Here,” Harry said, shoving the unopened package at him. “This is yours. Return it or whatever.”

Tom took the package slowly, reluctantly. “You can keep it, you know. I really don’t care,” he said.

“I’m not—I don’t need—” Harry was having trouble articulating himself. “You can’t just _buy_ people, Tom.”

Tom frowned. “I’m not trying to.”

Harry studied Tom carefully. Tom was watching him right back, dark brown eyes strangely bright in the awful fluorescent light of the student hallway.

“Well,” Tom said suddenly, stepping backwards and gesturing into his room, “since you’re already here, why don’t you make yourself at home? I took the liberty of making us some coffee while I was waiting for you to arrive.”

Harry peered around cautiously as he stepped into Tom’s dorm room. Everything here was neat and tidy, but there were two foldable chairs set up next to a desk. On the desk there were two cups of steaming coffee and… and a tiny bouquet of lilies sat in a small porcelain vase.

Was this a date? Harry glanced back over at Tom, who was wearing an innocent expression on his face. _Was_ this a date?

“Is this a date?” Harry asked aloud.

Tom gave him a _look_ that consisted purely of raised eyebrows and lots of undisguised judgement. “I don’t know,” said Tom. “If I was feeling more confident about what you thought of me, I _might_ be inclined to say it was such a thing.”

Harry thought about that. Then he said, “This was very clever, Tom.”

Tom beamed, pulling out one of the collapsible chairs for Harry to sit. “Welcome to our first date, Harry.”

“I really hope you made sure that you can return the phone,” Harry said, but he sat down anyways.

“Of course I did.” Tom sniffed, settling in the chair next to Harry. “Now, let’s see if coffee makes you any more agreeable to delivering more compliments.”

**Author's Note:**

> Lucius: Why do I have an email for a phone costing a thousand quid plus expedited shipping costs
> 
> Tom: I may or may not need to return something very expensive that I purchased on your Hogwarts Prime account.
> 
> * * *
> 
> find me & my writing updates on tumblr [here](https://duplicitywrites.tumblr.com)!
> 
> feel free to join my personal discord server for my writing [here](https://discord.gg/BJRP4A5)!


End file.
